Most of the people who are involved in biodiversity conservation work will agree with the assertion that the government funding that is available for biodiversity conservation is inadequate. And in order to get the government to significantly enhance the funding for biodiversity conservation, it may be necessary to convince the members of the congress that such funding is necessary. This is because when all is said and done, it is the members of the congress who ultimately approve government budget proposals.

I have come to believe that we need help from the professional lobbyists, if we are to be successful in getting congressional approval for enhanced biodiversity conservation funding. Some people argue that it is unethical to use the services of the said professional lobbyists. But that is debatable. For if we have no qualms using the services of attorneys in courts (to avoid going to jail or to avoid losing civil suits), I see no reason as to why we should hesitate to use the services of the professional congressional lobbyists. Trying to lobby the members of congress directly more often than not results in failure: because the members of congress are beholden to various vested interests. It takes an experienced professional lobbyist to figure out how to present the agenda, in order to curry favor with the congressmen.

Should we decided to use them, the brief of the lobbyists would be to (convincingly) show the congress members why we exactly we need the extra money. The needs are many: ranging from biodiversity conservation research, biodiversity conservation advocacy and biodiversity conservation outreach. It is within the domain of biodiversity conservation outreach that we find things like biodiversity conservation media campaigns and the improvement of biodiversity conservation college courses. At first sight, one gets the impression that these things don’t require a lot of money. But the truth of the matter is in that these activities are very costly, especially if we insist on them being done the right way. And if we can get the congress to increase biodiversity conservation funding by just 20%, that would translate into quite a bit of cash — which would then have great impact on biodiversity conservation work.